As corroborated by reviewers, it’s in the ballpark of “The Big Three-Oh” (or 30 if you need it in digits), and it’s nothing short of a game-changer for users sick of frequent recharges and lost time.

To put that in relative terms, BlackBerry Passport beats out the stamina of leading rival smartphones such as the Samsung Galaxy S5, iPhone 6 – and even the iPhone 6 Plus – by up to 9 hours.

(Read on to see the detailed comparative findings.)

Equipped with a competition-besting battery and efficient software and hardware, the BlackBerry Passport just stays “on,” no matter how much work you throw at it.

If you need a paperweight, grab a dead phone from another company.

There’s a Reason for the Stasis

Phablet fever aside, mobile devices have shrunk immensely over the past several decades due to advances in processor efficiency. We’re light years ahead of the giant car phones of yesteryear, like this one:

In the quest for thin, svelte devices, phone battery sizes have remained largely static. As a result, so has the resulting battery life – without the same logarithmic leaps in battery science that we’ve enjoyed in chips, battery power remains proportional to battery size.

What we get are consumer-grade devices all-too-quickly ticking down the minutes until the giant, power-hungry screens wink off.

Range Anxiety: A Life of Outlets and Chargers

This all can lead to “range anxiety,” a term usually associated with electric cars, and with good reason: An electric car’s usefulness is correlated to how far it can go on a single charge. That forces drivers to count the miles between trips and stick to routes with charging stations within reach.

Smartphone users go through a similar process – and similar stress.

Scenario 1:

You start your day after a paltry 5 ½ hours of shuteye, with a slew of scheduled (and unscheduled) meetings before you: meetings at your office, followed by meetings with the agency, followed by a lunch with a colleague to align on approach.

You’ve got data coming in last minute from your team across the globe and you WILL get the plan to the C-Suite by End of Day – even if it kills you.

Of course, you’ll also need to go back to the proverbial drawing board to establish if the solution you were proposing is still valid based on new data. You don’t have the time to sit at a desk with a laptop.

But wouldn’t you know it – as you’re on the train heading home and looking forward to an uninterrupted opportunity to pore over some vital information, your battery indicator starts flashing.

What do you do?

Do you turn to the guy next to you and ask if you can charge your phone off his laptop? He’d rather share his toothbrush. You might as well ask for some change with that charge.

You’ve downloaded the special apps made for the show and events, with those apps running as background processes. All the while you’re live-tweeting and handling various other social media functions.

Unfortunately, the location’s Wi-Fi isn’t any good, and the 4G strength is terrible, with your phone constantly seeking a signal.

All those pictures you’re taking are accompanied by your smartphone’s LED flash, and the battery has been draining like a bottle of champagne at a wedding.

You still have to cover the last keynote and send it all off, but there’s no way that’s going to happen on the scant charge you’ve got left.

There aren’t any available outlets near where you need to be, and your charging cable is only a meter long.

What do you do?

Do you sit on the floor in the hall and “hug the wall” for a half hour? You might as well take off for the restroom. There might be an outlet in between the soap puddles and damp paper towels, if you don’t mind charging your phone IN THE RESTROOM.

Both scenarios could go differently – you could be casually powering through with your BlackBerry Passport. Leave the sweat for the exercise room.

Numbers Don’t Lie – Capacity Matters

Whether you want to admit it or not, your battery size is going to make or break your long day of adventure (or misadventure).

Let’s compare the battery capacity in milliamp hours (mAh) of several devices and their resulting actual runtime under mixed use*

Runtime

BlackBerry Passport

Up to 30 hours

Samsung Galaxy S5

Up to 23 hours

iPhone 6

Up to 21 hours

iPhone 6 Plus

Up to 25 hours

(*Based on third-party lab testing sponsored by BlackBerry, under 4G and 3G wireless conditions, using a mixed-usage profile. Results will vary by carrier and network conditions.)

Feel Free to Travel with BlackBerry Passport

BlackBerry Passport’s 3,450 mAh battery owns the competition and your device wherever you go, helping you do what needs to be done when it needs to be done – no excuses.

For those of you who live in the US, the UK, Canada, France or Germany and are ready to be liberated from the nearest outlet, go straight to ShopBlackBerry.com to get your factory-unlocked BlackBerry Passport.

The above image portrays an x-ray of a lung viewed on the large square touchscreen found only on the BlackBerry Passport. In situations where you need a greater view of documents, medical imagery or technical schematics – screen size really does matter.

The 4.5-inch screen on the BlackBerry Passport is 1,440 x 1,440 pixels providing unique clarity and dimensions for a smartphone. Images like the one above, when viewed on other smartphones, can appear not only smaller, but less clear – opening the door to missed information. I’m no doctor, but I suspect having a clear view of the situation is key in reaching the correct diagnosis. In fields, where decisions can be a matter of health or safety, seeing the whole picture in detail is invaluable.

]]>http://blogs.blackberry.com/2014/08/passport-xray/feed/1Passport_White_XRAYdonnyhalliwellBlackBerry Passport, White Passport, X-Ray, Lungs, Medical Vertical, Claron Technology, BlackBerry AppWhen a Full Day’s Battery Life Still Isn’t Enoughhttp://blogs.blackberry.com/2014/08/fact-check-battery/
http://blogs.blackberry.com/2014/08/fact-check-battery/#commentsFri, 01 Aug 2014 16:35:49 +0000http://blogs.blackberry.com/?p=21105/ Read More]]>Having a mobile device with battery life that gets you through an entire work day is an absolute must, as “wall huggers” know all too well. As another company who is out to make wall hugging a thing of the past, Samsung touted the benefits of the battery life of its Galaxy S5 in a recent “Samsung at Work” blog post.

As you can see, their stats seem good – but BlackBerry can do better:

“Ultra Power Saving Mode saves and extends battery life by changing the device’s screen to black and white and shutting down all unnecessary features to minimize battery consumption. In Ultra Power Saving Mode, you can benefit from over 24 hours’ standby time with just 10 per cent battery life, ensuring that you never miss a beat.”

With better battery life than the Samsung Galaxy S5, BlackBerry Z30 owners use their device to remain productive throughout the business day and stream their favorite TV show or movie during the commute to and from the office. But don’t just take our #BBFactCheck for it; here is what some BlackBerry Z30 users are saying about battery life on Twitter:

@RosieBarton you need to try the BlackBerry Z30, crazy battery life. No wall hugging.

Earlier this week, I started to tell you about my experiences actually using the BlackBerry Passport (albeit a beta version). It has changed the way I work with its large square touch screen. At its core, this is a messaging powerhouse, built for writing and talking all day long. I can tell you right now, this device has the battery chops to back up all the conference calls, emails and browsing I do throughout the day, with more than enough juice to let me blast some tunes over Bluetooth for my commute home. When I get home I’m not running for the charger either… and if I forget to plug it in before bed (or am burning the midnight oil well into the night) it’s consistently still had enough charge to start the next day.

I Do Not Suffer from Range Anxiety.

I can now relate to electric vehicle owners that have to convince naysayers that they don’t worry about their battery going dead in the middle of the road. Because everyone who sees my BlackBerry Passport feels compelled to ask how the battery life is. “That screen is so big,” they say in disbelief. The fine engineers here at BlackBerry know that our customers demand a phone that will keep up with them, just as Tesla engineers realize that a car needs to be able to get you home at the end of the day. They’ve packed an impressive 3450 mAh battery in the new BlackBerry Passport.

“No other smartphone or phablet on the market today has a battery that large.”

Make no mistake, the BlackBerry Passport keeps going as long as I need it to.

Feature-Packed, Runs All Day.

To get the battery range that I and other business users demand, the BlackBerry Passport doesn’t sacrifice the features I use the most, like BlackBerry Assistant, productivity apps like Docs To Go, social media apps like Sprinklr, and calling.

I spend a large majority of my day on conference calls – raise your hand if you can relate. With our team spread across North America and the world, we can’t always interact in person. With BlackBerry Passport, BlackBerry Natural Sound technology gets even better. This superior audio experience was previously available only on BBM Voice calls. On BlackBerry Passport, the same effect has been adapted to work with cellular voice calls, too. There are four microphones onboard that help adapt the audio levels in real time to my ambient environment and position of the phone relative to my ear. This is, in part, how Natural Sound provides a dynamic and clear audio experience for me AND the other caller. I was curious how this worked, so asked one of our product managers to explain. They mentioned that one of the four microphones is placed in the receiver port to detect the ear position relative to the phone in order to adjust the sound accordingly.

The aim is to provide an experience that is as close to an in-person conversation as possible. In my use with the device, it sometimes sounds as though I’m in the same room as the other person. On top of this, there are stereo speakers providing tablet-like volume when I enter a board room with multiple participants (it sounds great jamming tunes on the weekend, as well).

Some of you might be thinking, “Don’t phone calls, especially on speakerphone or Bluetooth, really hog battery life?” In my beta usage, I haven’t found this to be the case.

More about that Keyboard.

I want to reflect on one of my favorite things about the BlackBerry Passport. Typing on my previous device, the BlackBerry Z30, was, and still is, a fantastic virtual keyboard experience. The touch-enabled physical keyboard on the BlackBerry Passport blends everything I love about a traditional BlackBerry keyboard (read: the physical keys) and the best aspects of the BlackBerry 10 virtual keyboard, including commands such as “Swipe left to delete” and “Flick to type”. On top of that, the keyboard provides fine cursor control and scrolling, which for someone like me who composes blog posts, novel-length emails and a ton of BBMs, comes in very handy.

I can’t wait for you to ALL get your hands on the BlackBerry Passport and BlackBerry 10.3. It’s a very versatile gadget. And YES, it does fit in my pants pocket.

Check for BlackBerry 10 OS Updates

Whenever a BlackBerry 10 OS update is released, make sure you install it on your smartphone so that you can take advantage of optimizations that can help improve your battery life.
Typically, you’ll receive a notification of an update, but to manually check for updates, open Settings, tap Software Updates, and then Check for Updates.

Accounts

Whenever possible, we recommend you use Microsoft® ActiveSync®, or IMAP over POP, when you set up a new account because they are more efficient protocols for a mobile device. If you need assistance setting up a new account, use the Help app, review the User Guide located at http://docs.blackberry.com, or contact your service provider for more information.

If you set up multiple accounts that support email, contacts, and calendar synchronization, only enable synchronization for accounts that you plan on using; this ensures that only necessary activity occurs. To review account synchronization settings, tap Accounts within Settings, and then tap the account you want to customize or delete.

Device Monitor

Device Monitor, first introduced in BlackBerry 10 OS version 10.2, was updated with the release of BlackBerry 10 OS version 10.2.1. New screens were added that allow you to view key details around battery usage so you can easily identify apps that have a negative impact on your battery life. For example, you can view battery consumption by application since the last time you charged your device, or by the last 12, 24, or 48 hours.

When you select an item from the Device Monitor list, you can view additional details such as CPU, memory, mobile network, and Wi-Fi® usage statistics. You can also view applications you installed, the amount of space those apps take up, and you can delete applications.

Connections

The radios on your BlackBerry 10 smartphone are designed with efficiency in mind, so turning off Wi-Fi, Bluetooth®, or NFC as well as changing your cellular connection to use a different network technology may not improve battery life. We recommend using Wi-Fi whenever possible because it offers substantial power savings; so make sure you are actively adding Wi-Fi networks and hotspots to your smartphone as you come across them.

Note: If you’ve set up Media Sharing, considering turning off it temporarily if need to maximize your battery life (Settings > Media Sharing).

Charging

Your BlackBerry 10 smartphone is designed make efficient use of the battery; however, you should still follow best practices to maximize your battery’s lifespan. Always use an official BlackBerry® Charger, charge for an extended period of time when possible, avoid charging in small increments (for example, less than 15 minutes), and do not your leave smartphone in direct sunlight (for example, on your vehicle’s dashboard) or in extremely cold temperatures.

Notifications

If you receive a lot of notifications throughout the day, consider reviewing and customizing your notification profiles. If your smartphone is set to vibrate when notifications arrive, this uses more battery life than having the LED light up. If you receive a lot of notifications overnight as well, swipe down from the top of the screen after you lock your smartphone to enable Bedside Mode, which turns off all notifications overnight.

For help customizing your notification profiles, open the Help app on your device and search for “Change your sounds, notifications, or ring tones” or review the user guide for your device that you can find at http://docs.blackberry.com

Android Applications

Android apps may continue running when the display is off, and we recommend you close these apps when not in use. To do this, press X in the lower right when the app is minimized.

Run in Background Applications

Some of the apps offered in BlackBerry® World™ storefront contain permissions to run headless, which means that they can use the battery when the application is not opened with an Active Frame. These apps may reduce battery life, so you can optionally adjust the Run in Background permissions if desired.

To identify what apps have the ability to run in the background, and optionally turn off this permission on a per application basis, complete the following steps:

While viewing your home screen swipe down from the top, and then tap Settings.

Tap Security and Privacy, and then tap Application Permissions.

Change the Permissions bar to Run in Background.

Select an app from the listing, and then optionally turn off the Run in Background permission.

To uninstall an application, tap and hold the application icon while you view your home screen, followed by tapping the trashcan icon.

Tip: Device Monitor is an easy way to identify and remove applications that may be using a lot of battery life.

Review Application and Game Refresh Settings

It’s a good idea to review the refresh settings within your favorite third-party apps and games, as some of them might maintain active connections to services or data that is still being transferred. Refresh settings are typically found in the settings screen of an application so make sure you review these screens after you install a new application or game.

Screen Brightness and Dark Themes

A significant way to reduce battery usage is to decrease the brightness of the display. Within Settings, tap Display, and then move the Brightness slider to a reduced setting that you find comfortable.

If you are using a device with an OLED display such as a BlackBerry® Z30 smartphone or the BlackBerry® Q10 smartphone, consider using a dark theme, which results in lower battery consumption. You can find an option to enable a dark theme in BBM™, the Contacts app, and the Calendar in the settings screen for the respective apps.

Lock Screen

To prevent accidental taps and presses that can turn on your screen (and decrease battery life), lock the screen by pressing the Power/Lock key on the top of your smartphone before you place it into your pocket, purse, etc.

Screen Lock Timeout

In addition to pressing the Power/Lock key to lock your screen, you should customize the Screen Lock Timeout setting. This setting controls how long your smartphone waits after being left idle before turning off the screen. To adjust this value, go to Settings, tap Display and change the Screen Lock Timeout.

Use a Case or Holster

Depending on which of type case or holster you use, putting your device in it may or may not turn off the display. On top of protecting your smartphone, using a case that turns off the display is a great way to save battery life because the display is shut off as soon as you insert your device.
To browse a variety of these cases, visit http://www.shopblackberry.com or check the available cases provided by your local retailer(s).

Tip: If your screen does not turn off after you insert your device into the case or holster, verify that you are using an official BlackBerry accessory or contact the manufacturer for additional assistance.

]]>http://blogs.blackberry.com/2014/02/blackberry-10-battery-tips/feed/09x16_bb10_2_1_devicemonitor_engtywill1BB10-BattTips01BB10-BattTips02Ten ways to extend your BlackBerry Z10 battery lifehttp://blogs.blackberry.com/2013/03/blackberry-z10-battery-life/
http://blogs.blackberry.com/2013/03/blackberry-z10-battery-life/#commentsTue, 05 Mar 2013 19:48:22 +0000http://blogs.blackberry.com/?p=16235/ Read More]]>How much battery life you consume may vary, depending on how you use your BlackBerry Z10 smartphone. To help your battery last longer, try any of the following tips:

Check for BlackBerry 10 OS Updates

Whenever a new BlackBerry 10 OS update is released, make sure to install it on your smartphone so that you can take advantage of any available optimizations which can help improve your battery life. Typically, you’ll receive a notification of a new update, but to check for updates manually, open Settings, tap Software Updates followed by Check for Updates.

Tip: To access your BlackBerry Z10 Settings, swipe down from top of the screen while viewing your Home screen and tap Settings.

Connections

The radios on your smartphone are designed with efficiency in mind, so turning off Wi-Fi, Bluetooth or NFC as well as changing your cellular connection to use a different network technology may not improve battery life. We recommend using Wi-Fi whenever possible because it offers substantial power savings, so make sure you are actively adding Wi-Fi networks and hotspots to your smartphone as you come across them.

Picture this: You’re at the airport, all of the outlets are taken and your smartphone battery is about to die. Or, you’re sitting at the beach relaxing and you get a few important emails, but the sunlight’s glare makes it impossible to read them. Or, you’re relaxing in a lounge chair at your hotel and realize you forgot your headphones.

Well, #TeamBlackBerry, if you have been in any of these situations, we have you covered. After speaking with a few of my friends and colleagues, here are my top BlackBerry® accessory recommendations for summer travel:

Extra Batteries
When you’re out and about at an airport, an amusement park or a beach, the last thing you need is a drained battery – especially when you aren’t close to an electrical outlet. Something I like to have at the ready is an extra battery or two when I know I’ll be away from a power outlet for the majority of the day. You can find extra batteries and external chargers for your BlackBerry® 7 OS devices (and others as well) on Shop BlackBerry, so be sure to grab a few before you head out this summer.

Anti-Glare Film
As summer heats up, many of us spend more time outside. Since BlackBerry people are doers, we know how important it is to be able to stay on top of incoming messages and keep in touch with the important people in our lives. To protect your screen against the sun’s glare and make sure you’ll still be able to see everything on your screen, check out this anti-glare film you can easily apply to your screen. Plus, your device’s touch screen will still be fully functional, so you’ll have the best of both worlds.

Premium Stereo Headset
If you’re looking for headphones that can multitask as much as you can, we have the a great option for you. Our Premium Stereo Headset not only gives you quality audio and sound isolation so you can hear your music clearly, but it also includes a microphone so you can hop on the phone and chat, too. What’s even cooler is it has a single button to easily navigate between calls and music – perfect for when you’re lounging on the beach and want to keep things simple. While you’re at it, be sure to give BBM™ Music a whirl and make a few summer playlists!

These accessories are our favorites, but we want to hear from you: what is your favorite BlackBerry accessory that you never leave home without?

The BlackBerry® PlayBook™ tablet is designed to give you a solid battery life depending on what you do, but there are some things you can do to help maximize the battery life of your tablet so you can stay connected, enjoy your media and capture amazing pictures and videos. We’ve compiled a number of tips to help you.

Dim the screen

A quick tip to help extend battery life is to adjust the screen brightness of the display to a lower value than the one you are currently using. To change your brightness setting, go to the Home screen status bar, tap on the Battery icon and toggle the brightness slider (in the yellow box below) to your desired value. Note, the system keeps separate brightness levels for whether you’re plugged in and charging or running on battery power only.

]]>http://blogs.blackberry.com/2012/04/save-playbook-battery/feed/0tywill1How to reset a BlackBerry smartphonehttp://blogs.blackberry.com/2012/01/how-to-reset-blackberry/
http://blogs.blackberry.com/2012/01/how-to-reset-blackberry/#commentsTue, 17 Jan 2012 21:44:31 +0000http://blogs.blackberry.com/?p=12425]]>Some useful information every savvy BlackBerry® smartphone owner should know is how to reset their device. A reset of a BlackBerry smartphone is a troubleshooting method that completely turns off and restarts the operating system software and applications of a BlackBerry smartphone. In terms of troubleshooting, it is a useful first step if a BlackBerry smartphone is experiencing hardware, software, or wireless network issues.

There are two options when performing a reset: a hard reset or a soft reset. The difference between the two is that performing a hard reset involves removing the battery temporarily, whereas when performing a soft reset, a key combination is used to reset the BlackBerry smartphone.

With the recent release of BlackBerry® 7, I want to share some battery saving tips to help you get the most of your BlackBerry smartphone – for both BlackBerry 7 and BlackBerry® 6. Listed below are several tips I use that you can start taking advantage of today.

If you’ve got a tip on how to extend battery life, leave a comment and let us know as we may feature your tip in an upcoming post. Let’s get started…

For all you hard-working developers out there, the BlackBerry® Smartphone Simulator is an essential tool: it enables you to run BlackBerry® smartphone applications on your computer. The BlackBerry Smartphone Simulator includes the BlackBerry native applications that are typically available on BlackBerry smartphones, and enables you to load and test your own applications. You can even simulate and test various connectivity and state changes – definitely useful when you’re trying out a new app! When you use the BlackBerry Smartphone Simulator to perform testing, you might need to simulate additional BlackBerry services; the BlackBerry® Email and MDS Services Simulator Package are available for this purpose.

In short, the BlackBerry Smartphone Simulator allows you simulate all the aspects of the BlackBerry smartphone including battery conditions, network conditions, SD Card, GPS capabilities and more. In this post, I will briefly describe how to simulate some of the functionalities of the BlackBerry smartphone. Before we go further, let’s quickly recap where you can find the latest BlackBerry Smartphone Simulators. All the most up-to-date BlackBerry simulators can be found at the BlackBerry Smartphone Simulators page under the Developer Resources section of the website. You can also head here for the complete instructions on installation details, and you can find more detailed information on the BlackBerry Smartphone Simulators at the BlackBerry Documentation site.

Ever wonder how you can get even more battery life out of your BlackBerry® 6 OS smartphone? Lucky for you, the new user-friendly OS makes it even easier to fit more productivity into your busy life before you start running low. With a few quick and easy tips from your friends here at the Inside BlackBerry Help Blog, you can get more life out of your device when you need it most.

Charging – Top it up!

To keep your device running in top shape, make sure your battery is fully charged whenever possible. Whether you’re at your desk, in your car or relaxing at home, keeping your device plugged in will ensure the battery is ready to go when you are.

Quick Tip: Wall chargers are the preferable method of charging as it is a direct electrical current to your battery which allows it to recharge quicker. Don’t have your wall charger handy? Check out this mini-adaptor to turn your USB cable into a one!

Hi everyone – my name’s Paul. I’ve worked at Research In Motion® (RIM) for over eight years as a Technical Account Manager, and I’m now the Manager of Technical Services for the Enterprise Sales group at RIM. For the past few months, I’ve been making a deliberate effort to conduct all of my work on my BlackBerry® smartphone (a BlackBerry® Torch™ 9800 smartphone, to be exact). This project started very slowly, but with each week, I learn what I can do to keep my laptop at home.

I started while on a business trip to Chicago, and although I had my laptop present, I tried to keep it in my bag. The next trip was to San Francisco, and once again, I had my laptop with me – but this time it stayed in the hotel room. For all of my meetings, I relied on BlackBerry® Presenter.

Before the holidays I tried my first official week where my laptop didn’t even make it on the plane – I was able to do all my work laptop free! Through January, as I head off to a week-long conference, I plan to leave my laptop at home. Very liberating – and all thanks to my BlackBerry smartphone!